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Thursday, June 23, 2011

Hawaiian Quilting

I am a fashion designer.

Quilting, to me, seems a million miles away from garment making, so when my aunt approched me about making her granddaughter a quilt I was cautious. " But you're a designer, a quilt should be easy right?" Maybe. So I dipped my little toe into the quilting ocean, and with some help from my local quilt shop found the colors requested and a pattern. While I was in there I fell in love with a quilt with wool appliques that would go perfectly in my bedroom, nevermind the fact that I rarely have seen a quilt up to this point that I liked much less loved. But that will have to wait, I finished the quilt for my aunt. I was pretty proud considering it was my first and I swore my only, since shoving it through the arm of my little machine was not fun!

Then while surfing the net I got a glimse of a Hawaiian quilt and I was in love for sure! I think I am drawn to the simplicity and beauty of them. They usually only consist of two solid colors. So now I'm thinking what makes a Hawaiian quilt, Hawaiian?

After some quick internet research, I find that the missionaries brought cloth and quilting techniques to the natives and the natives based their designs on flora and fauna of the Hawaiian islands. The design is folded and cut on 1/8 (think paper snowflake making), and then appliqued on. Then there is typically echo quilting (think ripples in a pond) stitched out to the edge. And no you don't need to be a native or in Hawaii to make a Hawaiian quilt. So, I've only made one traditional quilt in my life, when can I dive in?

Well for once I decide to follow someone's advice and try a small quilt that I can make into a pillow, if I didn't care for it, no big investment, if I loved it I could continue on.

So I march right back to my local quilt shop and proclaim I am doing a Hawaiian quilt! What? You've never heard of this? How can this be? But they were more than happy to help an amatuer muddle her way through the supplies. It is harder than you would think to find solid colored quilting fabrics!

I chose a white batiste and an aqua and green batik.

I cut out the design.

Next, baste on the applique.

Because this design was so small I did not turn the edges under.

Next I layered the batting and backing together and grid basted it.

Now for the fun part, hand quilting the applique﻿ and the borders.

You can use a hoop which was nice.
I enjoyed sitting down in the evening and picking up my quilt to work on.

Soon however Mother's Day was around the corner and I decided to finish this up and give it to my mother. So the rush was on, I decided to label this one, always nice, and dedicate this to my mother.

Mom lucks out, it looks pretty beautiful on my bed!

I am very tempted to keep it, but now I can make a new one, I am already forming plans...
Wait now I am a designer and a quilter, how did that happen?